Woven

When we were purchasing our tickets at Waterloo station in London, our ticket porter told us a story about an American couple that put Jenna and I both in stitches on the floor. This is a true story.

An American couple was standing in cue at a busy London station on one of the hottest days of the summer. The line was long and people were hot and bothered and waiting for their tickets, and this loud, boisterous woman was demanding of everyone’s attention.

“In Kentucky, the summers are waaaaay worse than this. Oh my gawd, I almost died of heat stroke this one time…” And as she blathered on about nothing important her silly, skinny husband stood in the background looking quite bored with his life. She was clearly the one who took charge of everything in their marriage and this little man just went along for the ride.
When they stepped up to the porter, he asked her where she would like to go.

“Woven, please, it’s in Scotland.”

The porter proceeded to click away on his computer, and came up with nothing. “Are you sure this is the correct name?” He asked.

“Yes, of course, I’ve booked a hotel and everything.” At which point she exploded at the thought that a ticket wouldn’t just appear magically in her hands. She proceeded to angrily accuse the entire British civilization of not knowing anything. “I just knew when I came here that you people wouldn’t understand us! Why does this have to be soooo difficult, oh my GAWD!” In an attempt to calm her down and prevent any fights from breaking out between her and the other twenty Brits standing in line listening to this conversation, the porter asked her to pull out her hotel reservation. Maybe there is a phone number they could call and ask where the nearest station is?

She proceeded to begrudgingly retrieve a sweater from her handbag and showed the tag to the porter. The tag read: Woven in Scotland.

The entire cue proceeded to erupt in laughter, and the porter had to explain the error. Her husband snuck out of the cue unnoticed, clearly embarrassed, while the woman turned a bright shade of scarlet and gathered her things while she stormed out.